Story+2009-09-30+East+Rutherford,+NJ

“Evening, New Jersey (crowd cheers) nice to be in my backyard (crowd cheers) join us tonight to, uh, shut the old lady down (crowd cheers) we’ve had a lot of great nights here…let’s make this another one…this is something I wrote for tonight…”
 * 30.09.09 East Rutherford, NJ, intro to “Wrecking Ball”**

“Good evening, New Jersey (crowd cheers) from north to south and east to west (crowd cheers) we’re so glad to be here with you tonight, it feels so good to be home (crowd cheers) now the mighty E Street Band has been on tour all year practising, practising, practising, practising just for this moment (crowd cheers) and we’re here this evening to fulfil our solemn vow…to rock the house! (crowd cheers) but we’re not just gonna rock the house tonight, we’re gonna build a house in this room, a house out of spirit and out of music and out of Jersey soul (crowd cheers) and out of faith and out of hope and out of noise…now the mighty E Street Band is here tonight and we’re gonna bring down the power of the music on you…but, New Jersey, we need you to make the noise (crowd cheers) that ain’t fifty thousand (crowd cheers) that ain’t fifty thousand (crowd cheers) that ain’t fifty thousand (crowd cheers) come on, come on…”
 * 30.09.09 East Rutherford, NJ, middle of “Working on a Dream”**

“Thank you, thank you, thank you – woo!...alright, alright…give me some light…we were trying to…think of some things that’d make our last stand here at Giants Stadium special, we’ve, uh (crowd cheers) had a lot of big nights here in your company and, uh…so, uh…what we’re gonna do is I think Friday night we’re gonna play “Darkness on the Edge of Town” top to finish (crowd cheers) Saturday night we’re gonna play “Born in the U.S.A” top to finish (crowd cheers) but tonight (crowd cheers)…”
 * 30.09.09 East Rutherford, NJ, intro to “Thunder Road”**

“Thank you (crowd cheers) these are the guys that made the music (crowd cheers) and Phantom Dan Federici (crowd cheers) alright, back to work!...get your asses back on those instruments!...”
 * 30.09.09 East Rutherford, NJ, intro to “Waitin' on a Sunny Day” (following “Jungleland”)**

“It’s too cold to stop (crowd cheers) Steve, get your guitar, please – Kevin! (a drum roll) oh yeah...I only got two words, uh, three words…play it, Steve…(music starts)…let me see those signs, what you got out there?...I shake my booty…what you got here…bring it, bring it, bring it…bring it, oh give me that one...oh yeah, baby…what’s it say?...(?) …”Twistin’ the Night Away” – that’s pretty good – “let me tell you…” alright, getting warmed up now…not that – it’s impossible…that’s too old…give me that thing, man…(?) yes…yes…yes…(?)…oh, Steve …keep going, boys…don’t stop now…woo!...oh, that’s right…listen to me now…if there’s something you need…”
 * 30.09.09 East Rutherford, NJ, intro to “Raise Your Hand”**

“Everybody’s dancing…now keep playing that, boys, don’t change yet…the E Street Shuffle…is a dance with no dance steps…it’s just a dance that you do every day to get through the bullshit…and every night…are you ready, man?...here we go…Everybody say “Oh, oh yeah (crowd sings) everybody form a line…”
 * 30.09.09 East Rutherford, NJ, middle of “The E Street Shuffle”**

“This is for the kiddies out there (crowd cheers) are you ready, Roy?... (…) Aah…(?)…hey, C…I had the weirdest dream I ever had a few nights ago…it was one of those dreams that, uh…you wake up (?) …and when you wake up, you go “Oh, fuck” (laughs from the crowd) “Thank you, Jesus, thank,” you know, you start praying to the God you don’t believe in and, uh, it was one night, I woke, I woke up and it was like “Oh, Jesus Christ, it was a dream”…but it was the weirdest dream…I think I ever had…I was in my house… and uh…there was a lot of people around…I, I, I don’t, I don’t like a lot of people around…and, uh, but there was a shitload of people in my house and, uh, it was actually filled with my relatives…every relative since I was like…you know, living in Freehold, a little baby boy (crowd cheers) that’s bigger than the population of Freehold right there (laughs from the crowd)(?) but it was filled with like my aunts and uncles and, uh, I had to entertain, had to entertain everyone…oh, Jesus, and…and I was walking through my house like in a trance and, uh…then came the scariest fucking part…all the fucking lights, all the lights…and all I remember was this cake… (chuckles) this is the part, this is the part you won’t believe: there was sixty fucking candles on that cake (crowd cheers) sixty fucking candles! (crowd cheers) on the cake! (crowd cheers) and I started like to not be able to breathe and, uh…then (crowd sings “Happy birthday”) and then the worst part (crowd keeps singing) and then there were (crowd keeps singing) and then there were…C, then there were thousands of people reminding me of something I was trying to forget (crowd cheers) and then…then I woke up…then I woke up…I woke up after that…man, was I glad to wake up…I woke up and, and when I fell back to sleep, I…I…took month-long vacations in the stratosphere…”
 * 30.09.09 East Rutherford, NJ, intro to “Growin' Up”**

“Thank you for coming out to the show tonight (crowd cheers) come on, Willie, come on out and join us, Willie Nile’s gonna join us …but first, Sister Soozie Tyrell… (…) Little Steven (crowd cheers) Garry W. Tallent (crowd cheers) Curtis King (crowd cheers) Sister Soozie Tyrell (crowd cheers) Willie Nile tonight (crowd cheers) the mighty Mighty Max Weinberg (crowd cheers) the brilliant Professor Roy Bittan (crowd cheers) Charlie Giordano (crowd cheers) Cindy Mizelle (crowd cheers) Nils Lofgren (crowd cheers) and the biggest man you’ve ever seen: Clarence “Big Man” Clemons (crowd cheers)…Jersey! (crowd cheers) Jersey! (crowd cheers) Jersey! (crowd cheers) Jersey! (crowd cheers) Jersey! (crowd cheers) Jersey! (crowd cheers) Jersey! (crowd cheers) Jersey! (crowd cheers) you’ve just seen the heart-stopping, pants-dropping, hard-rocking, earth-shocking, booty-shaking, love-making, Viagra-taking, history-making, legendary (crowd: “E Street Band” and fireworks go off)(crowd cheers) that’s right, we splurged for the fireworks (crowd cheers) ...”
 * 30.09.09 East Rutherford, NJ, intro to “American Land”**

“Yeah, yeah, yeah, thank you (crowd cheers) woo!...alright…one second…(long pause)…alright, thank you, thank you for coming out tonight (crowd cheers) woo!...we got a few left…first I wanna thank our friends that are here with us from the Community Foodbank of New Jersey (crowd cheers) and, uh, Willie Nile, where did Willie go? …(?)…hey, Will…grab a guitar (chuckles) three chords, there’s only three chords, that’s all we play, how hard can it be? (chuckles) but, uh…our friends from the Community Foodbank of New Jersey, Community Foodbank of New Jersey has been feeding the hungry here in the great Garden State, each year they distribute over 23 million pounds of food to those in need…and uh…all you gotta do is pick up any newspaper and you see unemployment rising and rising, you realise all those folks out of jobs, folks that have kept their heads above water, slipping through the net and, uh…a lot of people need work – Mr. President, put us back to work (some cheers) the Community Foodbank of New Jersey is often the only safety net people have between, uh…having their kids go to bed hungry or with something in their stomachs…uh…this is a song called “Hard times, hard times come again no more”…I used to do this thing back in the mid-‘80s…where before “Born to Run” I would say that “Nobody wins ‘less everybody wins” and, uh…for a long time I stopped saying that, I stopped saying it because I…there was a point where I felt it was naïve and that’s not the way that the world goes around…but for the past thirty years, since, since the Reagan administration the middle class, the working class people got so squeezed…that, uh…really that idea is all we have, that we’re sitting on the precipice at this moment, we need affordable health care for each and every American (crowd cheers)…so nobody wins ‘less everybody wins… (…) Nobody wins unless everybody wins…”
 * 30.09.09 East Rutherford, NJ, intro to “Hard Times”**

“I’m gonna send this one out to Patti…we’re gonna get her out Friday night…Patti, wherever you are - come out tonight!...”
 * 30.09.09 East Rutherford, NJ, intro to “Rosalita”**

//Compiled by Johanna Pirttijärvi//